


Brainstorm

by Winterling42



Series: The Woods [2]
Category: Magic: The Gathering
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Eavesdropping, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 02:20:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10777428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winterling42/pseuds/Winterling42
Summary: Ral starts asking questions: just who is this Jace person? And why IS he hanging around Ravnica University anyway?





	Brainstorm

**Author's Note:**

> This is increasingly taking notes from [Elsewhere University](http://charminglyantiquated.tumblr.com/post/157198258378/coexisting-with-the-fair-folk-who-have-taken-up), because writers like to steal things.

Ral realized reluctantly over the next few weeks that he was interested in the puzzle Jace made of himself. There were no Jace’s enrolled at Ravnica University, for one thing. No last name made it harder to trace him, but it was an uncommon name. Ral even checked the apartments around RU, but none of them had a Jace on the lease either.

In fact, the more he looked, the less he found, and that in and of itself was intriguing. Jace didn’t even attend regular classes, except for Mizzet’s Physics and Climate. Ral was the only TA for the class, so he knew Jace was only attending the lectures with all one hundred and fifty of the students. It seemed like cheating to try and catch him in class and look for answers. Much more fun to snoop around the registrar’s office and the quad, watching for what classes his mystery man was going to.

Of all the things he’d expected Jace to be, involved with the campus police was not one of them.

It was dark outside, but not too late, and Ral was honestly only taking a short cut through the parking lot back to his apartment. The rain that had been threatening over the past few days had fallen into a mist, just enough to make his hair drip but not enough to make it interesting. The combination of rain and dark made sound echo strangely through the empty lot—Ral heard Jace’s dry tones, but he didn’t immediately see where it was coming from.

“It’s not like I could have sat them down and asked nicely. Besides, weren’t you just saying that the Orzhov have fewer debtors than ever since the Maze?”

Orzhov? As in, the student loan providers? Ral tilted his head, listening intently.

“This town has functioned perfectly well without you for nine hundred years, Guildpact. We don’t need you changing things up now.” A woman’s voice answered, harsh but quiet. Hissing whispers to go with the hissing rain. Ral crept closer, craning his neck to see where the strangers were.

“I dealt with the problem.” Jace again, his voice sharp and defensive. “And I was within the bounds of the Guildpact, as you well know, Lavinia.”

“You should have taken it through the Senate.”

“And waited until those students were _dead_ before anything was done?”

In the pause that followed this statement, Ral spotted the two of them standing next to the distinctive white-and-blue of a campus police car. The woman was dressed in the kind of uniform that needed more starch than water for washing, and Jace was slowly getting soaked in a navy-blue dress shirt and a vest that glittered with silver embroidery. It was somehow even less practical than the officer’s.

Ral loved it.

“You should have taken it through the Senate,” Lavinia said, so quiet that Ral could barely hear it.

“Your concern has been noted, Officer. Can I get out of the rain now?”

“Jace. You’re the Living Guildpact now. You can’t just blackmail people into doing what you want.”

Ral couldn’t see Jace’s expression from here, but he imagined there was some resentment in it. Whatever his face looked like, he walked off without another word to Officer Lavinia. Ms. Starch Pants climbed back into her patrol car and peeled off—carefully, and with exacting attention to the speed limit.

Ral stood in the rain a moment longer, putting his hands in his pockets. Despite the miserable weather and the hundreds of questions this eavesdropping had raised, he laughed and laughed and laughed.

**Author's Note:**

> I can write a no-power AU, she said. 
> 
> I can totally make these characters non-magical, she said.
> 
> 5 minutes later...ok so they all have magic.


End file.
